Drum (12 page)

As the shadows lengthened, an obese man, so fat that he had to be supported by two Negroes, made his plodding way around the courtyard, stopping at each grating. One of the blacks supporting him spoke to the slaves in their own language and told them to line up at the grating. The fat man looked them over, his small eyes making a quick and expert inventory before he passed on to another cage. After that, they slept.

What a relief it was to be able to lie on one's back or on the left side. But the body enforces strange habits and the men foimd they were only comfortable lying on their right side, as they had slept all during their long voyage. When they awoke in the morning, they were in the same tightly packed position as on shipboard. Tamboura's arm wais under Omo's head and he was lying on M'dong's arm, with their bodies pressed closely together.

Three days and three nights passed. They were given water for bathing and oil for their bodies; they were exercised in groups in the patio and fed better and more generously than they had been since the first night at Yendo Castle. Each day they had some sort of meat, stringy and tough but flavorsome, and cooked with vegetables, with fruit to follow it. Their bodies filled out and their skin became sleek and glossy again.

The welts had completely disappeared from Tamboura's back and once again it was smooth as satin. He cleaned his teeth with the rind of limes, bit his fingernails off evenly, and painstakingly rubbed his toenails against the stone floor until they were smooth and even. They were all connoisseurs of their own bodies and spent much of their day

attending to them. In truth, they had nothing else to do; their bodies were their only possession.

Soon after they had eaten, on the morning of the fourth day, two white men appeared, immaculate in starched white clothes. Tamboura had never seen such elegance before and his eyes popped as he saw the gold rings on their fingers, and their glossy long black hair tied behind with a narrow ribbon. He admired the closely woven hats of white straw and the highly polished shoes. Ay! someday he too would be dressed like that. The men made a slow circuit of the courtyard, accompanied by the fat man who bowed and grinned at them. One by one the gates opened and the slaves inside stepped out. The older of the two men gave only a quick look at most of the slaves awaiting his inspection and shook his head, but occasionally he would point to one particular man and have him step apart from the rest. When they arrived at Tamboura's cell, they stopped and looked at all ten of the slaves. The older man, his lips pursed, eyed them, then pointed to Omo.

"A Mandmgo?" he asked. The fat man ducked his head in a series of nods and smiles and spouted words which were meaningless to Tamboura, whose turn it was next.

"Royal Hausa?" The man seemed astonished.

Again the fat fellow went through his fawning ritual.

It was M'dong's turn, and the man looked him over and smiled. He motioned for the three of them to step forward and dismissed the others. Together with those he had chosen from the other cages, they were lined up and told to shed their breeches.

Now the younger man took over. He examined them carefully, running his hands over their bodies, making them squat and leap in the air, throwing a stick down the length of the patio for them to run after. Then came the part that Tamboura hated, when the hands of the white man touched his genitals, hefted them, examined them, and pulled back the flap of skin. The fingering angered and excited him. The three men walked away and left them standing there but soon the younger man returned. The cell that Tamboura had occupied was emptied and the men selected were put into it.

Meanwhile the slaves of the fat man had been busy, knocking together a wooden platform at the far end of the patio and later placing rows and rows of wooden benches before it. Around noon the courtyard began to fill with white

men, some in stiffly starched white suits and some in dusty garments, who looked as if they had come from far off.

The door of the cage occupied by Tamboura and his companions was imlocked and they were told to shed their breeches and line up outside it. Here they stood while many of the white men came and examined them. It was the same procedure—hands run qxiickly over arms and flanks, eyes spread open and fingers inserted in their mouths. And always the same anger-creating abasement of having white fingers paw at that which they had been taught to consider sacred and private.

Time and again Tamboura had to kneel and rise, turn and bend, open his mouth, jimip in the air, squat down and spring up, submit to the same humiliation as the white fingers felt, weighed and examined. His hatred of the whites, generated in Africa and grown on the voyage, was inflamed by the gross liberties these men took with his body, their smiles, smirks, grins and guffaws. Only for one white man did he feel some grudging respect—the older man who had come earlier in the morning and had now returned. This one only looked at Tamboura but did not touch him, except to lay a hand on his shoulder and say something to the young man who accompanied him.

Gradually the assemblage took their seats on the wooden benches and the fat man was hoisted up onto the platform where he sprawled in an oversized chair. The first caffle of ten men—the contents of the first cage—was led up the steps of the platform and placed in a row at its front.

The fat man began to speak and as he spoke the men below answered him, some in a loud voice and some by merely a nod of the head or by lifting a finger. Tamboura could not imderstand what was happening, nor could M'dong nor Omo. Finally there was a lull, and the fat man banged on the table three times with a wooden mallet. Then he pointed to a man seated below him and the caffle was led down from the platform, taken back to its cell and locked inside.

Soon it was the turn of those in Tamboura's cell to be led up the steps and to stand in line before the many faces looking up at them expectantly. The talk started. Arms were raised, heads were shaken, nods were given. The fat man talked back to those below him, raising his voice to a strident whine, and still they kept shouting at him. To Tamboura it seemed that there was more excitement than there had

been with the other lots. He recognized the white man who had put his hand on his shoulder, and his younger companion who had examined him earlier. The older man was sitting quietly amid all the commotion, merely holding up one finger from time to time.

As he tried to figure out the strange ritual in which he was somehow involved, it dawned on Tamboura that he, along with the others beside him, was being sold. If so, he hoped it would be to the quiet man sitting down there. For some reason, he seemed to hate him less than the others. He caught the man's eye and smiled at him, and the man smiled back.

The usual lull was followed by the banging of the fat man's hammer on the table. He spoke once, twice, a third time. There was a hushed silence.

"Sold ... to don C^sar and his son, don Gregorio."

Tamboura and his companions descended the steps of the platform and as they came down the young man met them. He was surroimded by others who were slapping him on the back, shaking his hand and talking to him. Extricating himself from his well-wishers, don Gregorio led Tamboura's group away. But this time they were not locked in their cell. They were told in fairly intelligible Hausa to put on their breeches and follow him.

Outside the patio they saw a sumptuous high-wheeled carriage, followed by a long wagon drawn by four mules. Seated in the carriage was the older white man. Don Gregorio got in beside him, and then a Negro who spoke Hausa ordered the slaves up in the back of the wagon and they set off through the streets of Havana.

The big wagon almost completely filled the width of the narrow streets and the walkers on the sidewalks had to stand in doorways while they passed. Tamboura, along with the others with him, was happy. Once more they were out in the life and gaiety of the city and there was much of interest to see and talk about. Soon they passed under a gate of masonry and the houses became fewer and there were more trees. The air was fresh and sweet, the sun shone and the trees looked like dripping fountains of bright flame-colored flowers. Birds sang, and colored butterflies sparkled in the clear air. From time to time they passed black men like themselves on the road who stopped and waved at them, sometimes calling messages to them in Hausa. As they went farther from the city, they saw tall fields of cane

on both sides of the road, and as the stalks undulated in the breeze it reminded them of the ocean they had so recently left. It was hot but the breeze cooled their skin and they chatted together excitedly. They were neither manacled nor shackled and for once they were riding and not walking. Verily this country was a fair one, clean and orderly and well cared for. There was a tropical exuberance to the landscape but it was neither the unkempt jungle nor the sun-parched plains of Africa. It was green with grass and trees and cane and colorful with flowers. Enormous white houses sat far back from the road behind long rows of palms that lifted their acid green fronds high on straight gray pillars.

The road dipped down to ford a shallow stream and the carriage and wagon halted. The driver told them to get out and they lay flat on the sandy bank, drinking the clear running water. Then they were told to scrub themselves clean, which they did with the fine white sand in the river, and they dried themselves in the sun. The driver lifted the seat of the wagon and handed them big chunks of some spongy white stuff with a brown crust, and said they should eat it. None of them had ever seen it before, but eat it they did and it tasted good. After relieving themselves in the bushes, they piled back into the cart, washed, fed and refreshed. Tamboura had noticed that all the time they were sporting in the water the two white men kept their, eyes on them, while they were talking to each other. Tamboura felt they must be discussing him, for he saw the older man point directly to him and, as he had done during the sale, he grinned at the younger man, who nodded his head slightly in return.

The road continued and the sun behind them sank in a violent swirl of golden clouds. Darkness came soon and with it a chill that made them huddle together for warmth. The deep indigo of the sky changed to a velvet blackness, sprinkled with stars which vied with a pale disc of moon to silver the road ahead of them. Over the black fields, thousands of tiny pricks of light came and went in circles of pale light from the fireflies. The only sounds were the wheels of the wagon crunching on the gravel of the road, the voice of the young man singing in the carriage ahead of them and the steady hum of the insects of the night.

Tall white masonry posts appeared like ghostly sentinels I out of the darkness and the carriage turned in between

them. They followed up a long road, white in the moonlight, except where it was striped by the shadows of the palms. Ligp^its twinkled ahead and a white man, escorted by two blacks with flambeaux, came out to meet them. The carriage drove up to the house and the two men got out. The yoimg man took a seat beside the driver of the wagon, which continued around the big white house and down along a street of palm-thatched huts in front of which groups of Negroes were sitting. From the door of each hut a yellow light gleamed, gilding the faces of the Negroes when they walked in front of it.

The wagon stopped and the young man jimiped down. He carried a piece of paper in one hand and walked over to a lighted doorway to study it. In the imknown tongue, he spoke to the driver and he in turn told the daves to get down out of the wagon. A Negro from one of the huts appeared with a lantern which he handed to the white man, who held it high, examining the faces of Tamboura and his companions. He signaled them again to untie the string which held up their breeches and lowered the lantern to scrutinize their bodies.

"You," he tapped Tamboura on the shoulder. "Over here." Again he passed down the line and sent M'dong and Omo over to where Tamboura stood. "Come along with me," he said in his halting Hausa and they followed him, leaving the others under the guard of the driver.

He marched them down the street a short distance to where an old woman sat in the shadows before one of the huts, surrounded by the vague forms of other women.

"Mama Baba," he called out, "I've brought you three strong sons from Africa. Do you want them?"

The old woman stood up with some diflBculty, for she was so enormous she seemed to be a part of the dark earth itself arising.

"Si, Sehor!" she laughed in a high pitch of excitement. "Three sons are what I have been wanting and my three young girls want them even more. I've had no men in my hut for many months and these girls sure been itching for a man. Bless you don Gregorio and bless don Cesar for buying them for my httle posies."

"Well, here they are!" He left them standing there as he walked away.

The old woman waddled over to them, her arms wide-stretched, a broad grin on her face. Her immense arms en-

gulfed them and her breasts, like soft, overripe melons, pressed against them. Her Hausa was rapid and fluent.

"I'm your Mama now. I'm your Mama Baba. Ay! what fine sons I have and what are your names?"

"I am M'dong." He stepped up, his breeches in his hand.

She embraced him separately and her excited cackle became a shriek of pleasure. Her big arm nudged him into the light from the door.

"Ay de mi! Ay de mi! Maria Luz, here is a man for you—a fine man. He's strong and vigorous and I hope he beats you and knocks some sense into your silly head."

A young woman arose and stepped boldly forward from the shadows. She was tall and comely and the light from the door turned her brown skin to gleaming copper. Mama Baba took her hand and placed it in that of M'dong. Together they retreated to the bench in the shadows,

"Put on your breeches, man," the old woman called after them. "Can't have you sitting out front of my bohio naked."

"And you, big boy?" She brought Omo into the light and ran her hand over his shoulders.

"I am Omo."